


What's on the other side of town?

by orphan_account



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Blow Jobs, F/M, Fluff, Gallifrey Lives AU, Time Lord Racism, Vaginal Sex, and so does the Doctor, because they suck, okay i'll stop, the Master's........
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-14
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:15:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27008701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Gallifrey has called everyone home and closed the ways back into space after the Master has found out and shown to the Doctor who she really is - The Timeless Child. The Time Lord society is turning against her and the only person by her side is the Master. | AU
Relationships: The Doctor/The Master (Doctor Who), Thirteenth Doctor/The Master (Dhawan)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 38





	What's on the other side of town?

**Author's Note:**

> Imma go crazy and give this a triggerwarning for racist themes and actual fucking attempts of stoning the Doctor.

_Time Lords didn't bury their loved ones in Black._

_They wore Red._

_They wore Red for almost everything though, that's why Susan had had a whole closet full of the most different shades of red, before she'd get her own ceremonial dress robes. Wine red skirts, glaring red blouses, even red headbands. She had loved it, loved dreaming about her future as a proper Time Lord, loved dancing around in her favourite red dress in the twin sunset._

_Three weeks after they buried her parents, Susan collected everything red from out of her closet and went down to the village of Commoners, as they were called so dismissively by the Time Lords, to donate it. When she came back, she was crying and ran into the kitchen to wash her face, telling her grandfather with wavering voice that the other children had spit at her._

_That night, the Doctor had to sit down with her and explain her all about the privilege of being a Time Lord and what it meant for the Gallifreyans who weren't chosen for that path and what they thought of them in return._

“ _So they don't like us... because we don't make them feel like they belong?” she asked after a while, tentatively. “That's odd. Because... I don't feel like we belong much, either.”_

_The Doctor had been stunned at that admission. Stunned that in her young years, she'd feel just like he had. A few more weeks passed by, in the now so painfully empty and quiet house that once had been a home._

_Then, one night, the Doctor sneaked into Susan's room, gently waking her and turning the lights on._

“ _What would you say?” he asked, sitting down on the ledge of the bed as she rubbed her eyes sleepily. “If I said we'd take a little trip, you and me, hm?”_

_Susan's eyes widened._

“ _Back down to the rivers?” she asked hopefully._

_The Doctor chuckled._

“ _No, no, my child, I thought a bit more... broader, maybe. What would you say to a trip to... everywhere?”_

The Doctor had never pictured herself back again in this house. The silence was all-surrounding, the trace of laughter and happy memories long gone, leaving nothing but the painful reminder of death following her wherever she went, ever since that very day.

Now, here she was, sitting on the windowsill, staring at the rain leaving patterns on her window, while the wind tugged at the high-grown, wild bushes and trees of her old garden.

Not even Susan was here now to keep her company. When Gallifrey had called everyone back to come home, she had taken her son and moved with him to a little, pretty house down a few villages, as far away from the citadel and its politics as she could manage.

The Doctor couldn't blame her. In fact, if she could, she would do the same... However, the council had other plans for her.

“We closed all travel ways out into space for now,” they had explained as they locked away her TARDIS safely with all the others. “No one goes in our out. We are _one_ civilisation and it's time to rebuild. Together. Now, you will repay your debt to society and work for the army.”

“Oh, I love when fascists say that, don't you?” the Doctor had replied, more bitterly than she would've liked.

The Time Lords in front of her had merely regarded her with cold stares and unmoved faces.

She wasn't well-liked on this planet, exactly, not after the news, the revelations about her had started to spread like a wildfire. Not after everyone had found out she wasn't one of them.

And yet, they had ordered her back with the rest of them and decided to put her “unique skill set” to use.

“I don't want anything to do with your army. Your battles. Your wars. I thought I had made as much clear when I sent you all to hell.”

“Well, we're back now and we're telling you it's this or prison for betrayal of the Time Lord race and identity fraud.”  
  
“Identity.. what?” the Doctor had spluttered. “It's hardly my fault you lied to me all my life! It was in the Matrix! Some of you must've known about...”

But the door had opened and two guards with raised guns were stepping in.

“Please, do accompany this creature outside.”

“Creature?” she had asked, her face darkening. “Really? We're going there? I'm a person, just like I have always been.”

“And an excruciating annoying one, at that,” one of the Time Lords had replied. “Just leave, please. You know where you're stationed. Don't be late or there'll be sanctions.”

  
It wasn't as if her “unique skills” were in high demand, the Doctor had realised on her first working day, as she had gotten pushed around by guards and soldiers, been laughed at and mocked by their teachers and basically used as a courier all day, carrying crates with training guns from one spot to the next.

It was nothing but another veiled reason to torture her.

She wasn't sure how her odd status of being a foundling child from some unknown corner of the universe had been shared this efficient and quick all over the city, but it was becoming tedious. People were looking at her like she was the scum of Gallifrey, like she had somehow become this whole other person, like she hadn't spent her whole life – well, the one she remembered – as a Time Lord just like them.

It wasn't as if Time Lord was strictly something that happened through blood relation. It was a title to be earned and she had done that, but none of them seemed to care about that in the slightest. “Sneaked into the house of Lungbarrow,” she heard the people whisper behind her back. “Clawed herself titles she didn't deserve.”

There was no point, the Doctor supposed, in calling them all a bunch of racists – They already knew and prided themselves with it.

Rebuild society, she snorted. On days like these, she honestly thought it was a lost cause. What was there to rebuild? More classist thinking, exclusion and tyranny?  
  
Still, until there was a new president elected – or more likely, simply appointed by the council – there was no one to complain to, no one but the council pushing her around.

It wouldn't be half as bad, the Doctor supposed, sighing deeply as she rested her head against the cool of the window, if it wasn't for how the Master was treated ever since he had returned.

They used to be in this together. Most of the times, it had been them against Gallifrey, them spending all their time together, as kids, feeling like they didn't belong and feeling okay in it, because they belonged to each other instead.

Now, people were celebrating him as some kind of twisted hero, some bringer of the truth and they hadn't spoken a word since. Her mind was still reeling from all he had discovered and the rough way he had shared it with her.

Rubbing her forehead, the Doctor finally got off the windowsill, poured herself a glass of water and made her way to the bed. Everything inside of her was fighting the possibility of sleep, was fighting the morning coming any sooner. More cruel mockeries, more horrible comments and stares, more pointless and humiliating work.

But she needed some rest and if she was being honest, she almost craved the few hours a night she could let her mind allow to wander back off into space.

A ball was, quite frankly, the last thing she needed.

When they announced it, people were cheering, were saying they could do with something to lighten their moods and minds.

The Doctor had silently crunched up the piece of paper in her hand and chosen to just spend the evening in her bed with a good book, as she tended to do a lot these days.

It was their nasty comments that changed her mind.

It was the constant laughing and sneering and staring in her direction. It was the little crowd of people that had gathered around the Master, laughing mincingly at everything he said with their heads thrown back, as they seemed to attempt to touch him every waking second.

He was enjoying the attention thoroughly, telling one stupid joke after another, stories upon stories, all relieved of their gory details for their pleasure.

And yet... Rumours had started spreading about him “waiting for the right person” because he had started to decline invitations to the ball one by one.

It had gotten a kind of challenge in the Citadel. Who could get the mysterious, beautiful hero of their pure Time Lord race to get to the ball with them?

It all could've gone well. If only the Doctor hadn't seen them point at her, heard them laugh at how she'd never get a date, about how much they'd laugh if she tried to ask him.

Like they knew him better. Like they had any claim upon him. Like he was _theirs_ , when he had always, always been hers.

It was what tipped her over, finally. It was what made her finish her break early, pack away her book and stand up from the little shadowy place underneath a tall tree to walk up to the little crowd, straight into their middle and come to stand right before the Master.

“Hi there,” she said, her first words to him ever since... ever since that night. Ever since he'd shown her what he had found in the Matrix. Ever since the alarms had resounded through the little chamber and the whole citadel and everyone had found out.

He stopped mid-sentence, his arm still in the air, ready for a dramatic gesture that would never come, surprise on his face.

“Hi.”

The Doctor raised her chin, ignoring the loud giggling and cruel whispers about her.

“Want to go to the ball with me?” she instead asked, incredibly simple and a little smirk tugged at the corners of his lips.

“Sure,” he replied and the effect was immediate. The giggling died down as if someone had pressed the mute button and utter, shocked silence spread around them. He added, intentionally cheerful, “Pick you up at seven?”

She nodded, gave the little, stunned group around her a little wave with her most self-satisfied little smirk and strolled back off to her tree.  
No one got near her for the rest of her break.

That evening, she sat on her bed, despairing over dresses – God, she hated dresses, it was like they were a whole new art form she just couldn't grasp – when it knocked on her door.

The Doctor, having learnt to be careful in this new, rather hostile environment, threw a look out of the window, before racing down and opening the door.

“The ball's in a week,” she pointed out as the Master leant against her door frame, grinning.

“Just checking in, love,” he scoffed.

“Aw, that's so sweet and caring of you,” she smiled sarcastically. “Just how I know you.”

He rolled his eyes and sneaked past her into the house, seemingly not caring whether he was invited or not. He wandered through the empty, bleak rooms with a grimace and then up to her bedroom, where light was falling from into the main hall.

“Ah,” he grinned. “Life. What happened, did your closet explode?”

“I'm trying to pick a dress for the ball,” she sighed, resigning herself to her fate – He apparently was staying. “I'd ask you what you think, but you'd probably go with purple?”

“For me? Absolutely. You? I see you more in that ocean blue one,” he replied, frowning. “But why do you want to wear a dress at all?”

She looked at him in worry.

“What? Isn't that what people wear on balls? I thought...” She frantically turned back to her closet, already going through another pile of clothes.

“People, maybe,” he laughed from behind her, suddenly standing so close, she could feel his body heat. “You're not people, though.”

“Right,” she replied, attempting to turn around to him and finding herself trapped between the closet door and his very close rip cage. “But I gotta say, I honestly feel like I've drawn enough attention to myself, lately.”

He stepped back from her, very suddenly, a deep frown on his face.

“It's a bit hard even recognising you, right now, you know that?” he asked, sounding... sad? “You've gotten more quiet than I've ever seen you. Today, when you asked me out, I thought... I don't know, it was the most Doctor-like thing I've seen you do in a while. Kinda hot.” He wriggled his eyebrows.

The Doctor rolled her eyes and turned towards the closet again, pretending to sort out some of the mess, trying not to let him see her thoughtful expression.

“I haven't even figured out who I am yet, myself, really. After everything you told me... I had no time to work through any of it, before it was in everyone's mouth.”

The Master snorted.

“Why? What does it change? You're the Doctor and you always will be. If you're changing, it's because of them, not because of finding out you have more past than you know of.”

“Doesn't it bother you at all?” she asked, whirling back around to him. “You've known me for all your life, doesn't it...”

He growled at that, loudly and threatening and the Doctor almost fell backwards into her closet.

“Do I look happy to you?” he said with gnarled teeth. “Do you think I need a reminder? I'm not. I don't. But I need you to bloody man up and be the Doctor now, because I can't stand this, okay? I can't stand loosing our past _and_ our future. And I can't watch this bloody tragedy one more day.”

He stepped out of her bedroom, still seething with rage, his hands clenched to fists as she followed him out.

“And get something to hang on the walls,” he shouted. “This place is bloody pathetic.”

With a slam of the door, he had left the house, leaving the Doctor staring at her walls with her mouth hanging open.

She didn't see the Master all of the next week, but when he came to pick her up for the ball, there was a life-sized picture of him hanging over her living room wall, right in view of the door, going from... well, actually, it wasn't that long, it barely covered half the wall.

He was a bit tiny this time around. Then again, who was she to talk.

The Master looked at it and nodded, his lips pressed together in a fake-impressed expression.

“Funny.”

“I thought you'd like it.”

“Really amusing.” His eyes flickered down her form. “That's what you're wearing?”

She had dug out an old suit she had liked to wear one regeneration ago, red-lining and all.

“Yeah,” she replied, chin raised high.

The Master smirked.

“Beautiful. Come on, then.”

He offered her his purple-clad arm and she grinned, linking it with hers.

“Why am I doing this again?”

“Lots of punch,” he replied immediately, apparently having thought of it before. “And a buffet.”

“Right,” she sighed. “Off we go, then.”

“Okay,” the Doctor muttered through her teeth as every pair of eyes in the room was directed at them the second they had entered. “I'll need a drink. Or six.”

“I got you,” he replied with a low voice and led her straight towards the bar, humming a little tune, apparently completely unconcerned about the stairs. To the Doctor's surprise, he pulled out six wine glasses and started filling them with punch.

“No, wait, I didn't mean...” she started but he had already turned around with his most childish grin and started pressing them between her fingers. Punch was flowing to the floor or onto her shoes left and right and with a desperate laugh, the Doctor raised her hands and attempted to catch the drops falling down. He laughed and clapped as he watched her and it was so easy, so endlessly easy to just forget about everyone else and just focus on his laugh.

“Oh no,” the Doctor chuckled breathlessly after a while. “Oh no no no, this is actually pretty good, Master!”

He took three of the now only half-filled glasses and took a deep sip out of two of them at a time. Giggling, she watched him as he nodded in painful agreement.

“Pretty good, yeah. Maybe we should actually drink the rest.”

For a while, they just stood by one another and he managed it so easily to just tune everyone else out for her, always refilling the one glass she had resorted to, making her laugh with silly quips and puns, his familiarity and closeness wrapping around her like a protective blanket in the middle of a frozen cave.

“Do you really feel that way?” she asked him after a while, because she just had to. “That we lost our past?”

He shrugged.

“You were the first person I ever loved,” he replied. “It's odd. Thinking that I might not have been yours.”

She regarded him with a quiet smile.

“What?” he asked and her smile grew into a grin.

“I'm the _only_ person you ever loved,” she finally said, because she knew him and he snorted into his punch.

“What can I say, the other's just aren't as pretty.” He raised his hands and rested his cheek on them, as if entirely smitten. “It's the shiny gold hair.”

“Right and here I thought it was my captivating personality,” the Doctor gave back dryly.

His face turned serious.

“There's no one like you out there in this universe, Doctor. No one. Believe me, I looked.”

With a suddenly dry throat, the Doctor took her glass again.

“Yeah, well...” she muttered. “I've looked too.”

The Master looked like he wanted to say something but couldn't quite find the words. Once upon a time, it had been enough, just having him by her side. Being so painfully different, it was alright, because he was so much like her, knew the depths of her soul like she knew his and it was as if they _recognised_ each other in it.

But lately, she had barely recognised him anymore. When he was Missy, maybe, maybe that had been the closest to getting him back, but...

Well...

She just didn't know where he stood, anymore. With her? Opposite of her? Somewhere in the middle? Hard to tell.

As they stood there, both lost for words they desperately needed to find, the first tunes of a song played they both knew all too well. They exchanged an immediate glance and with a little smirk, the Master held out his hand.

“I think it's our duty to dance to this,” he grinned and with an excited smile, the Doctor took his hand, letting him drag her into the already dancing crowd.

Suddenly, it came back to her, the looks of the other people. Hostile stares thrown to her, from over their shoulder's partners and the side lines. She simply bit her lip, raised her head and focused back on him. On his warm, brown eyes so completely transfixed on her.“I meant it, you know?” he whispered, as they both waited for the – for now – quiet song to pick up pace. “You look beautiful.”

The Doctor smiled.

“You're not too bad either, Oakdown.”

He grinned just as the music got louder, faster and with a quick whirl that almost knocked out the couple closest to them, started leading her in a chain of highly complex, absolutely silly dance moves they had thought out themselves as kids.

The couples around them all stopped to stare at them, then quickly fled off the dance floor with disgruntled expressions, clearly scared to get a kick to the shin if they didn't.

Well, suited them right, really, the Doctor thought.

When the last tone faded, she did what she had always done and threw himself into his arms. It was weird, how memory could take over, sometimes. She supposed it helped that he looked bloody gorgeous, that his eyes were glowing with so much love and warmth he'd very rarely shown, that his hair hung in his face all tousled up from the dancing and that his lips looked so damn kissable.

All she knew, as she leant in to kiss him, was that he was the one thing in her life that hadn't changed – Including herself, including all she knew about her life. He was her one constant now, the one thing to hold on tight to and she hoped this would, at the very least, prove to him that their past was still very much in tact.

He seemed to get the message, because he was holding her as if his life depended on it, kissing her deeply, beard scratching over her soft skin, heat spreading through her and.... -

Something hit the back of her head with a loud and painful “clunk”.

Turning around in shock, the Doctor caught the next punch glass with her forehead and fell back, staggered. The Master caught her, his grip around her arms tightening as yet another glass flew into her direction. He dragged her out of the way quickly, his face cold and serious and strained from the concentration she knew he wore before making a kill.

He was soaring with anger.

But instead of going into attack mode, he had taken off his jacket, wrapped it protectively around her head and started swiftly leading her out of the hall. Behind them, she heard shatters, more and more frequent. Once in a while, she felt a splitter roam her, but nothing hitting her too deep. From her forehead, she felt warm blood trickle down her face.

“They're...” she stammered, barely able to focus her thoughts. All seemed to be frozen. Her insides, her mind, her blood. “They're... are they... are they trying to stone me?”

Cool night air hit them and the sound of shattering glass finally stopped. The Master was shaking and his lips were pressed together as he led her further and faster down the road, away from the building. She knew he was angry, knew it was all he could do not to explode in a rage that could possibly end all of Gallifrey.

She was in too much shock to even feel angry, to even feel sad. She just knew she was cold and something warm was running down her face.

He led her wordlessly back home and she wished he would talk, wish he would tell her anything, would call them names, would tell her he didn't care what they did to her, he'd still dance stupid with her in the middle of the room.

In the silence, she could make up so many words. So many cruelties thrown at her from the one person who could do what all these people with their glasses had tried to do.

But he never let go of her hand, never loosened his grip, never unclenched his jaw, until he shoved the door shot behind them and led her by the shoulders into her bedroom. Sat her down on the bed, gently but determined, before walking off to get a little first-aid kid.

“Hold still,” was the first thing he managed to say as he started to disinfect a wound right over her eyebrows.

But the Doctor couldn't hold still. Now the shock was wearing off, tears were starting to grow and her whole body had started shaking.

“They... tried to stone me,” she said again. “They really... they...”

“They're a bunch of horrible, disgusting, fucking... “

“Stone me...”

“I'd kill them, one by one, but that'd be too good for them,” he roared, his own hand now trembling too much for him to actually fix up the wound. He threw the kit against the wall behind her.

The Doctor winced.

“Stop!”

He immediately froze.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, such a rare word between them, the Doctor's hearts actually started to clench. She leant against his shoulder and he shifted slightly to grab the kit back, while still keeping her close. He got out a piece of cotton and pressed it against her forehead.

He pulled her into a hug then, a proper one, voice hoarse and broken when he whispered into her ear, “I get it now. Why you ran away.”

The Doctor froze all over. What could she say to that? That she had always thought he knew? That she had always thought he'd understand? That she had never needed to be away from _him_?

Luckily, he didn't seem to expect an answer.   
  
“Come on. Get out of that suit. We'll just go to bed, yeah? Rest a little?”

 _We_ , the Doctor noted.

“Yeah. I'd like that. Yeah.”  
  
Mechanical, she got out of her clothes, lying down in nothing but her shirt, and the Master did the same, wrapping himself around her before wrapping a blanket around both of them and it felt safe. _He_ felt safe.

She was still shaking, but he held her still, his lips trailing gently over her neck, her cheek, every bit of skin he could reach and finally, finally there were words. Whispered reassurances, as he got over his own shock and anger, so many promises that he was there, that he always would be, so many promises that they would pay and most of all, so many “It'll be okay”s, she could almost believe them.

Whenever the Doctor woke up that night, sweating and screaming, he was there, sleepy, with rings underneath his eyes, holding her, comforting her and the whole night turned into a twisted, confusing fever-dream, an in between of being awake and asleep, but all along, the Master was there with her.

The next morning, the Doctor woke up next to a little note on her pillow, saying he had to leave and would be back with lunch.

The Doctor thought about breakfast, about getting up, about a job to get to, but the blanket still smelled like the Master, the promise of lunch hung in the room and so she just continued to lie in her bed, staring at the ceiling and waiting for him to come back.

When he did come back, he had indeed two bags of lunch in his hands he had stolen from the kitchens and spread it all out eagerly in her bed, presenting her with half of a feast.

She didn't have the heart to tell him that she didn't exactly have an appetite and ate from everything a little, just to thank him, really.

“So,” the Master said between forks full of brown rice. “I got good and bad news, which ones do you want first?”

The Doctor sighed, unsure how much more bad news she could take.

“Bad news first, always.”

He grinned.

“Knew you'd say that. So. People are never going to stop. Maybe one day, when they need you to stop another life-threatening catastrophe. Before that. They'll just go to new levels of horrible. I tried to talk to the council, but they don't see how... errr... 'expressing their dissatisfaction with having to live with you' is any of their fault.”

The Doctor paled.

“Okay. I could do with the good news, now.”

The Master smiled.

“You don't have to be here to live it.”

She dropped her fork, eyebrows raised.

“Yeah, I do. There's no way they'll let me go. They love torturing me too much.”

“They don't have to let you go,” the Master smiled back deviously. “Because you're the Doctor and if you want to leave, you just do.”

“They locked all ships away in high-security...”

“Security-shmurity,” he replied with a dismissive wave. “Who cares. You have a TARDIS in your garden shed.”

The Doctor frowned.

“No, I don't.”

He laid down his own fork now and poked her nose with a grin.

“Yup. You do.”

Understanding dawned on her and with wide eyes, she rolled out of bed for the first time that day, almost taking all the food down with her as she stumbled over the blanket in her rush, then skidded over the smooth floor out into the garden, still clothed in nothing but her socks and her shirt.

The grass went her to her hips, but she didn't care. She fought her way through the little path the Master had started in the wild garden and into the shed, ripping open the door and....

“Now, of course, when I said 'A TARDIS'...” She heard the Master's voice behind her, heavy with self-satisfaction, “...what I meant was _your_ TARDIS. Same old stupid thing. It's a wreck, as far as I'm concerned, and it was a shame, leaving all the pretty modern ones where they were... but I know your strange attachment to that old thing.”

She couldn't manage another word, she screamed, she couldn't help it, and ran towards her battered old ship, hands wrapping around the blue wood in an enthusiastic hug.

“Yup,” the Master muttered dryly. “That's what I was talking about. Hey, where's my hug?” he added as the Doctor had torn open the door and walked into her ship, eyes gleaming with happiness as she looked around the familiar, untouched interior. “Doctor!”

He seemed panicked, now, almost stumbling into the ship behind her. As if she would simply let him stay there and...

 _Oh_.

Why wouldn't he, the stupid, stupid idiot, when she had done exactly that before?

The Doctor whirled around and pulled him into a tight hug, gripping his head and kissing him as hard as she managed, arms and legs wrapping around him and he swooped her up and carried her over to the console, sitting her down to kiss her some more, hands roaming over her still unclothed body and she felt herself heating up, the cold finally leaving her, one bit at a time.

He was everywhere, all around her, embracing her, melting the ice like a warm fire, even as his hands wandered under hear shirt and into her panties. He seemed to plan a cruel double attack, twisting a nipple while rubbing over her clit in slow circles and the Doctor moaned against him, her legs tightening around him, unsure whether she wanted to hold him tight or invite him closer.

He took it either way, kissing her softly, his left hand wandering to her other breast now and the Doctor threw her head back, breathing heavily. She needed him, she needed him more than she had ever needed anyone. Her body was still new for her, sex still something she had rarely done in this set up, but when he touched her, it seemed to simply remember what to do, seemed to remember to react with bliss and when he finally had freed himself from his clothes, it was so easy for him to push in, the sound of him slipping into her wet folds almost obscenely loud in the quiet ship.

They had done this so many times, in so many bodies, but never like this. He started so slowly and she could see the strain on his face as he held back and pushed against him eagerly, inviting him to thrust harder, because, oh, she needed him to. He didn't wait much longer, taking her in long, hard thrusts, panting above her before he dug his teeth in her neck again, leaving stinging little marks she'd wear all too proudly.

“I can't believe you did this,” she whispered, her lips close to him, brushing over his ears as her hands wandered over his back, leaving shallow scratches. “You stole my TARDIS for me.”

“I'd steal the universe for you,” he growled back and grabbed her hips to pull her towards him. “I'd steal every bloody star, every single moon for you. I'd throw myself into the sun and bring it to you piece by piece, I'd...”

He came with a shuddering thrust, lips dying on his lips as he stood still for a second, eyes closed in bliss. The Doctor could feel him spill inside her and nudged him with tip of her toes at his ass. He opened his eyes with a breathless chuckle, bringing his hand back down to rub her clit, thrusting shallowly as he slowly softened and she came around him, clenching wonderfully.

Home. Truly, honestly, home. Here. With him.

“How did you even do this?” the Doctor asked, her fingers running over his toned chest with a smile, as they laid on the TARDIS floor, on top of his coat, both of them unwilling to get up to get into one of the many bedrooms on the ship.

He simply shrugged and grinned.

  
“Had a great teacher. Quite the legend, actually. People in the halls still talk about the theft of that old type 40, you know? 'Why that old piece of rubbish?' they ask.”

She laughed, kissing his chest softly.

“I don't know what I would've done without you. I don't...”  
  
She froze all of a sudden, sitting up to face him.

“Wait. What about you? Didn't you steal a TARDIS for yourself?”

It wasn't that he couldn't live in hers. He could. He would. But she knew him and she knew he'd need to have the possibility of independence. Needed a ship for himself around, at the very least.

“Oh love, of course I did,” he smirked, pulling her back down slightly to wrap his arms around her. “Stole it and hid it away well. I doubt they'll even notice it's gone over your very unsubtle disappearance, though.”

“Okay,” she breathed out. “Okay. Because...”

“But I'm going to stay.”

“You... what?”

She looked at him with pleading eyes.

“You can come... I'd like... don't you want...”

He took her head between his hands gently, pressing a kiss to her lips.

“I do. I will. For the record, I'm giving you a head start. This is not you leaving me. Because I will not be left again.”

“Then why aren't you coming with me?” she asked, eyes wide.

The Master sighed.

“Because they'll need a Lord President soon and I don't know if you noticed, but for some reason, people here seem to _like_ me now.”

“You're a hero in their books,” she spit. “Or were, at least, until you had the audacity to kiss me.”

He shrugged.

“I'll tell them it was some weird seduction power you held over me. They're twisted. They'll believe it. I don't know. I'll think of something. But the most important thing is – As soon as I'm president, I can...”

He bared his teeth in a manic grin and the Doctor suddenly realised where this was going to.

“That's your plan, is it? Taking revenge by driving their planet into madness?”

The Master's eyes gleamed dangerously.

“I'll ruin them, Doctor. I'll absolutely destroy them. The painful, slow, cruel kind. They won't know what hit them. And by the time I'm done with them, they'll beg me to light fire to this dusty old ball of trash.”

“I'd rather you came with me,” she whispered calmly. “But I know you. You won't be stopped, will you?”

“You won't try to stop me, will you?” he asked back and she shrugged.

“No. Beat them with their own weapons. Use their own broken system. I no longer care. But... come back to me. Soon.”

He kissed the tip of her nose.

“Always, Doctor. You just wait. In a few months, you can clap for me when I become President.”

“All you've ever wanted,” she replied with a dry smile but he tightened his grip around her, shaking his head slowly.

“No,” he said, resting his chin on top of her head, closing his eyes for a second. “Not exactly.”

_~ Nine months later ~_

He could feel her presence before he saw her. She stood at the back, unnoticed by everyone but him, as he got handed the stupid ass new sash, clapping, just like he had said he would.

She looked more like herself again, in that stupid rainbow coat with the stupid rainbow shirt and the stupidly cut trousers and the stupid, confident smirk on her face.

Gods, he'd missed her.

Nine months in linear time, on this rotten planet, sucking it up to people – He was so incredibly tired. All he wanted was take her in his arms, take her in his bed and then leave it all behind forever. But he was their President now.

And that meant he was ready to start their payback. Beautiful, beautiful payback.

He had so many plans, so much time to write them all down in a neat little notebook, filled to the brim, so much, he had to glue in extra pages in and it was _good_ , it was going to be so good.

But he did deserve a little break, for now.

And so, after a lot of congratulations and speeches he all endured with a smug little smile, – oh, you'll see what I have planned for the rest of your long, long lives – he sneaked into his bedroom, to find the Doctor wait on his bed, naked. His arms opened on instinct and she jumped up immediately and into them, feet flying off the ground as he whirled her around.

He took in her smell, the feeling of her small body back beside his, that distinct feeling of his mind coming home into hers and sighed in relief.

“I missed you so bloody much.”

“Yeah,” she grinned, a devious spark in her eyes. “Linear time is a bitch, isn't it?”

He raised an eyebrow.

“You old cheater,” he finally called. “How long has it been for you?”

She laughed.

“Two days,” she admitted, bottom lip worrying beautifully between her teeth. “But I still missed you.”

“I sure hope so,” he growled, pushing her softly onto the bed, then climbing over her. “Because you'll have to show me just _how_ much.”

Laughing, she rolled them over, climbing over him with a seductive gleam in her eyes. “I think that's fair,” she whispered. “You must be so tired, Lord President.”

The Master gave her a little smile.  
  
“So, so tired, my dear Doctor.”

She started kissing him deeply and he sighed in relief of her lips back on his, everything as it should be, while she ran her hands over his body, slowly shedding his clothes where she went. Waistcoat and shirt quickly lay discarded on the ground and he let it slide for now, because tidiness wasn't the first thing on his mind anymore, not with her hand wandering into his boxers when she looked up at him like _that_.

She went to place soft kisses on his stomach and wandered further down, pulling his trousers and boxers down with her. Her lips teasingly brushed his waistline, his thighs, went everywhere but where he needed them most, but she didn't torture him for long, feeling the exhaustion that truly sat in his bones, before lovingly kissing his cock.

“Mhmmm,” she moaned quietly. “I _did_ miss you.”

He couldn't help a little laugh escaping him.

“Excuse me, are you talking to me or my dick?”

“Both can be true,” she replied cheekily, before hollowing her cheeks and sucking his cock in, the sudden sensation of her lips around him turning his attempt of a reply into a moan.

“Fuck, Doctor...” he muttered, but she just laughed around him, the soft vibration making him shiver.

She let her tongue swirl around him and the Master shifted slightly underneath her, thrusting into her mouth shallowly, not willing to move terribly much, but he didn't need to – The Doctor was doing most of the work for him wonderfully, making him shudder and moan beneath her and if anyone, anyone else had ever seen him like this, he would've had to kill them, but it was alright, somehow, with her.

When he spilled into her mouth, she swallowed, a little streak of white running out of the corners of her mouth and he watched, transfixed, as she caught it with her tongue.

“There you go, Lord President,” she said with a wink, before climbing back up and kissing him on the lips gently. He could taste himself, could taste her and that's exactly how it should be, shouldn't it? His eye-lids fluttered shut.

“Let me... make it up to you...” he muttered sleepily, but the Doctor just chuckled and pulled the blanket around them.

“Next time,” she promised. “To give you a reason to finish your plan quickly and come home.”

 _Home_ , the Master thought and the thought seemed to take him by the hand like the Doctor used to, led him into peaceful sleep.

She was scrolling through his notebook with little laughs at almost every page.

“One's more insane than the other,” she muttered. “I think I like starting a war with absolutely every nation available and filling their weapons with cake best.”

“I did like it,” he sighed. “But I feared it'd be over too quick.”

“Truth is,” she said with a little sigh, closing the notebook and putting it aside. “Maybe the best idea to teach them a lesson is to... actually teach them a lesson? There are a lot of planets who suffered from the Time War. Who are still trying to restore what they once had, who have lost so many. You could... you know...” A dark gleam was in her eyes now. “... make our lovely people, how do you say? 'Repay their debt to their societies.'”

He kissed her chin gently and hummed.

“Yeah, why not. If it's Doctor approved...”

“Consider it approved,” she shrugged, snuggling her naked body closer to his, before grabbing the notebook one more time. “Would you really give up... what was it?” She quickly leafed through the notebook. “Are yes. 'Pouring hot milk over all their houses and families.' for that?”

“You know, while that is definitely one of my better plans,” he replied, making her laugh, “I think I could do that, yeah. It's, after all, a revenge for you, so what kind of a partner in crime would I be, ignoring your input?”

“The Commons,” she said, suddenly serious. “The normal people living down in the villages. Can you give them some power back? Before you leave? Make sure they get their fair share out of this?”

The Master rolled his eyes gently at her, but smiled.

“Consider it done.”

“You know?” she asked, chuckling as her hands rubbed over the small of his back. “You might accidentally end up being the best Lord President this universe could've thought of.”

The Master snorted, his tone indignant when he spoke again.

“Me? Please. It seems like you're the one who's just been elected. I'm just the one doing the _work_.”

“Well, you're doing it so sexily, what can I say,” she giggled.

He grinned, his lips roaming over her ear, gently sucking in her ear lobe, but before they could get any further, there was a knock on a door and a nervous looking guard entered.

“Lord President, I was sent to... to...”

His eyes found the Doctor, naked, under a blanket, in his arms, and they widened as he swallowed visibly.

“Oh.”

The Master raised his head with a perfectly polite expression that left no doubt about the threat he was speaking.

“One wrong word and I'll have you publicly executed.”

The guard eyes now almost seemed to want to bulge out of his face.

“I.. I understand. Errr.... your presence is being asked for... for one last interview...”

“But of course,” the Master replied, rolling out of the bed, leaving the blanket to protect the Doctor's naked body, as he stood, not wearing a single piece of fabric, to grab his clothes.

“It'll be a minute,” he said without even looking at the guard, sounding almost bored.

“Of... of course...” the guard replied but lingered, eyes still fixed on the Master's naked form, his tongue unconsciously licking over his lips.

The Doctor had enough.

“One more look at my man like that and I'll make sure the Lord President _does_ have you publicly executed,” she called out from the bed.

The guard flinched and shot through the door, while the Master continued clothing himself with a smirk that was ungodly hot.

He kissed her to say goodbye, both of them knowing it'd be best for her if she had disappeared quietly before he returned. She hated it.

But she knew he'd find her.

“Don't you dare take any more time,” she whined, still, because leaving was hard and he snorted.

“You're one to talk! You waited two days, I've been stuck here for 9 months without you. I promise you, I'll make as fast as I can.”

_~ One Year Later ~  
_

Now, she was the Doctor and where people needed help, she never refused. That being said, she was starting to begin that the help these people had requested of her... wasn't actually much needed? The old King, she found out, had been living in quite a comfortable apartment, while the new one, the alleged tyrant, had quite comfortably taken over his kingdom.

The Doctor, with the freed servants of the court who had told her of the horrific rumours of the tortured King, found him sitting in an arm chair, chewing on a big slice of chicken roast.

“Uhm,” the Doctor brought out. “We're here to... errr... rescue you?”

“Oh, that's awfully kind,” the old king replied with his mouth full. “Could we postpone that to after dinner, though? I'm awfully occupied right now.”

“I... I guess... sure...” the Doctor mumbled.

This would be the moment she'd exchange very confused looks with her companions, if only there were any. She had started to not pick up random humans anymore, in wise expectation of the Master coming back to her and possibly killing them in a jealous fit that was entirely like him.

The king had already turned his attention to his servants. “If you two could be a doll and pour me some of the wine? So good to have you back.”

Rather confused, the Doctor left them to, errr, _dine_ and wandered the halls a bit aimlessly, until she found the actual throne room. It had been right around the corner.

Everything was a little bit confusing.

“Hi there,” she said upon entering. “Now, I've heard quite some rumours about you, but people do say to form your own opinion and I'm a firm believe of people and...-”

She stopped herself as she laid eyes on the Master, sprawled over the throne with a crown on his head and Sceptre in his hands, a wide grin spreading on his face as he saw her.

“Hello honey,” he greeted her with a twinkle in his brown eyes. “I'm home.”


End file.
